“Behold for the time has come. The hour of reckoning is upon us. Prepare your hearts, for the father shall not be displeased. Our children, who have had their last breath, awaken once more, and partake in a feast.”, a divine voice boomed.
We were awoken by a voice that sent shivers to our core. Alice was covering her ears in a panic, Jack was shaking, and I felt a rush of anxiety that would not dissipate. I was scared, even with the mental preparations I made, even with all the foresight I had about this apocalypse. I could not help but worry. The few people I care about may die, and I dragged them away from their family to look for an artifact that could be anywhere in West Texas.
“Hey Dante, you need to snap out of it. Don’t you hear that shit man?”, Jack yelled.
After Jack’s yelling I noticed the commotion coming from outside. It looked like pandemonium. People were getting attacked by other people, cars were flipped over, the pool was dyed red, and body parts were strewn across the property. As I watched the world end right before my eyes, I heard a another much gentler and beautiful voice.
“Hello, Chosen welcome to the End. The world you once took for granted is no more. We now will enter the era of entertainment and enlightenment. To veer you back on the correct path we have enabled a system which will allow you to unlock your true potential. By now those who remain will notice your own personal status menu. As you progress you will learn that the system will be one of your most valuable tools and will unlock more functions as you progress, however enough of that. The first round will be based on survival and point collections. For every enemy you kill you will accumulate a certain number of points depending on the difficulty. The number of points accumulated will determine your rank within the state and country you reside in. The higher the rank the better rewards you will be given at the end of the first round. The individuals who rank highest in each state will be given the opportunity to participate in a bonus round.”, the beautiful voice info dumped.
After absorbing all that information I said, “Alright, I hate to say this, but I told you guys.”
“Dante, I really don’t think it’s the time for you to prove you were right.”, Alice sighed.
“Alright, my bad are you guys ready for this?”, I asked.
“I really don’t think I am, but what other choice do we have?”, Alice said.
“I’m as ready as I’ll ever be but does that blank book give you any hidden rules we should know about.”, Jack said.
“Other than the secret artifact we need to find, no it said this round is straightforward, but let’s focus on preparing. I’m freaking out and I’m not trying to die.”, I said.
After some preparations such as putting on protective gear, making sure we all had something to protect ourselves with, and making rereading the Geiger counter instructions and attempting to remember the video I watched on it the day before I handed Alice the gun because she’s the only one of us who has ever used one and we made our way to Jack’s SUV.
Jack slowly opened the door of our hotel room making sure the coast was clear. Jack took the front, Alice was in the middle, and I was in the rear. Surprisingly, the hallway was relatively clear. Maybe it was because we were at the top and the chaos had not reached our floor yet, however it was oddly suspicious and unsettling.
“Alright guys we’re on the 17th floor, we can go about this in two ways. We can take the stairs or the elevator. The elevator could possibly stop on other floors, and we don’t know what could be waiting for us. Also, the power might go out which could lead to some issues. On the other hand, others might think the stairs are the best option and from what the outside looks like I don’t trust chances of us encountering another person or group.”, I said.
“This is something that we should have thought about earlier Dante but let’s take the stairs. We can think of it like a reverse miniature version of that one Final Fantasy 7 Remake scene, and you can complain about it the whole time.”, Alice said.
“Alright the stairs it is.”. I said.
We entered the staircase and of course it was dark. Jack pulled out his flashlight and we made our way downstairs. We descended floor by floor and on the 5th floor we heard an animalistic roar and the screams of the floor’s occupants.
“Guys I think we should see what’s going on, it doesn’t feel right to ignore that.”, Jack begged.
“Jack, I know you want to help those people, but it’s pointless. What are we going to do? We don’t even know what monster is making those sounds.”, I hissed.
“Dante, we have protection if anyone can help them it’s us. Let’s just check it out. If it’s something we don’t think we can handle we will leave.”, Alice pleaded.
“You guys cannot be serious, and you thought I was crazy? Whatever it’s our funeral.”, I said.
I followed Larry and Curly to our possible death. As Jack slowly opened the door to the fifth floor the stench of metal hit me. To make matters worse screams and cries could be heard coming from the end of the hall. It sounded horrible, children crying for the parents to wake up, fathers and mothers praying to a God with deaf ears, and the sound of flesh being ripped off from bone. As we entered, I felt like I was going to vomit as I saw blood splattered in everywhere on the hallway and body parts littered on the floor. As Jack realized the gravity of the situation he bolted towards the screams. I barely had enough time to grab his backpack, but it was pointless. It felt as if I was attempting to stop an unstoppable force. He was practically dragging me along with him without slowing down.
“Jack, I know you’re worried, but you need to calm down. We have no clue what we are dealing with. You can die, I can die, and Alice can die Jack! If we don’t get what we need our odds of survival drastically decrease. Think about your and Alice’s family man.”, I said.
Jack began to slow down, looking at me with deep sadness. It was honestly one of his best qualities. His desire to help and protect those in need, but right now charging blindly into the unknown will only put us in even more danger. After slowing to a halt and taking a couple of deep breaths. He turned to me with eyes full of resolve.
“Jack, we’re going to save whoever we can let’s just go slow okay?”, I said.
He nodded at me and slowly started to approach a room where some of the screams were coming from. Jack opened the door and what we saw made my stomach churn. A humanoid creature was devouring the intestines of a women. I could feel my knees becoming weak and my heart began to pound out of my chest. The woman was unable to scream. She was just laying there twitching with a soft whimper. She did not even react when she saw us. Her will to live gone.
Jack began to heave and charged at the beast. The creature leaped over Jack with a speed that was inhuman. While it was landing, I attempted to swing my bat at its side, but it slapped me with enough force to slam me against the wall. I couldn’t breathe, the air I was so desperately attempting to inhale into my lungs would not come. I tried to get up, but I couldn’t. Everything just kept getting darker and darker.
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“Alice protect Dante!”, I screamed.
The creature attempted to lunge at Dante’s unconscious body, however I was able to barely hold it back. It was obscenely strong, it felt like my arm was going to be ripped off as I attempted to hold it back with my left arm. I pulled the creature with all my strength and kicked it in the back. I could hear spine crack from the impact. This caused the beast to let out a guttural roar from the pain. However, even with a broken back it persisted. It got in an animalistic stance resembling a cheetah. After a stare down that felt like eternity, I tightened my grip on my bat and used all the force I could muster, but as my bat was about to hit its head it stopped. The monster was able to stop my bat with its bare hand. With its free hand it punched me in the stomach causing me to lose my grip on the bat and lurch from the pain. As I struggled to get back up it also slowly began to stand up as if it was mocking me. The creature was big, it probably 4 or 5 inches on me, but a body that thin and frail shouldn’t be able to exert this much power or speed. I let go off my bat to escape, but it was too quick. As I took a step back the creature wrapped its left hands fingers around my throat. It slowly lifted me off the ground and it was getting harder and harder to breathe as its grip slowly got tighter and tighter. As it saw me struggling it began to laugh. Its laugh was demonic in nature. I kicked, clawed, and struggled in its grasp, but nothing I could currently do was enough to escape. As I was slowly losing consciousness. As I began to lose consciousness I heard a loud bang.
I awoke to see Alice frozen in fear and hugging me. As I looked up, I saw the creature choking Jack. In a panic, I grabbed the gun from Alice, pushed her off me, and shot the beast. I saw the thing and Jack tumbled to the floor. Jack was greedily inhaling the air with deep breaths while looking at the ceiling. While taking everything in I heard a notification.
“Hunter killed.”, an angelic voice said
“+ 10 exp. Level up! +2 free attribute points gained. 20 Karma acquired! Skill acquired Calm mind (common).”, the beautiful voice said.
“System.”, I thought.
Dante Alcantara Grade F Level 2 EXP: 0/25
Class: N/A Title:
Affiliation: None
Karma: 20
Health 9/15 MP: 16/16
Stats
Strength: 8
Agility: 6
Intelligence: 8
Mind: 7
Vitality: 5
Toughness: 6
Spirit: 8
Charisma: 5
Luck: 10
Extra Points: 2
Resistances
Fire: 0%
Water: 0%
Earth: 0%
Air: 0%
Poison: 0%
Cold: 0%
Acid: 0%
Electricity: 0%
Radiation: 0%
Equipment
Shirt +0
Protective vest +2
Jeans +1
Shoes +0
Skills
Calm Mind (Common)
Mission: Survive until the end of the first round.
Points acquired: 10
I chose calm mind from the skill section and read over what it does.
Calm Mind (Common)- [Passive] Allows the user to suppress negative emotions to keep a level head in any situation. Novice level- 10% decrease on effects of negative emotions.
“Dante, help me lay Jack on the bed.”, Alice yelled.
After snapping out of my rude moment of curiosity, I lifted Jack and put him on the bed. Surprisingly, it was a lot easier than I thought. I noticed one of my stats increased and saw my strength increased by two. Jack’s a big guy, he’s probably pushing 300 pounds, so I wanted to see how much stronger I was now. I looked at Jack and noticed he looked sullen.
“Hey man are you okay?”, I asked.
“Yeah, I’m fine…I just really thought we were done for, and I couldn’t even help her.”, he said.
“I know man, but it’s not your fault none of this is. You did your best and that’s all you can do. Are you able to get up? We must go as soon as possible. It’s not safe here.”, I said.
“Yeah, I can get up my bad. I was just shocked.”, He said.
“Wait…you could have got up this whole time?”, I laughed.
“Oh yeah, it looks like I leveled up and I feel a little better. Also, what about you? Did you level up as well?”, he said
“Oh yeah, I even got this cool skill that allows me to keep my cool in various situations.”, I said.
“Really? I got a skill, let me check it out.”, he said.
After looking into the skill he acquired, I was honestly a little jealous. All my skill does is make me slightly calmer, but Jack apparently got a rare skill called Reinforce. Which increases his Defense by 15 percent and strength by 10 percent. It’s odd, my skill helps me with my weak mental fortitude, and Jack’s helps enhance his gifted physical ability. Maybe the skills we learn naturally are tailored to increase our odds of survival. After taking a breather and calming down we made our way to Jack’s SUV. Thankfully, everything else we encountered were considerably weaker than the Hunter. It was mainly the aptly named undead Zombies and Giant Rats as big as a Dachshund. The Giant rats were the tricky ones. They had a semblance of sentience compared to the zombies and were fast. We learned that they were generally passive, so if we did not bother them. The Zombies on the other hand were relatively slow and weak, but from the few unfortunate cases we witnessed they were contagious. It seemed like the hunter was an advanced type of undead. However, none of the corpses it consumed was reanimated, so it looks like it was not contagious. After battling our way to the SUV, we were relieved to see that it was still intact. We boarded and I turned on the Geiger counter to see if we could find the artifact we apparently desperately needed.
Alice Carter Grade F Level 2 EXP: 3/25
Class: N/A Title:
Affiliation: None
Karma: 0
Health 12/12 MP: 18/18
Stats
Strength: 4
Agility: 7
Intelligence: 7
Mind: 9
Vitality: 4
Toughness: 4
Spirit: 10
Charisma: 7
Luck: 5
Extra Points: 3
Resistances
Fire: 0%
Water: 0%
Earth: 0%
Air: 0%
Poison: 0%
Cold: 0%
Acid: 0%
Electricity: 0%
Radiation: 0%
Equipment
Shirt +0
Protective vest +2
Jeans +1
Shoes +0
Skills
First Aid (Common)
Mission: Survive until the end of the first round.
Points acquired: 6
Jack Townsend Grade F Level 2 EXP: 15/25
Class: N/A Title:
Affiliation: None
Karma: 0
Health 16/24 MP: 4/4
Stats
Strength: 11
Agility: 7
Intelligence: 4
Mind: 3
Vitality: 8
Toughness: 9
Spirit: 2
Charisma: 9
Luck: 6
Extra Points: 1
Resistances
Fire: 0%
Water: 0%
Earth: 0%
Air: 0%
Poison: 0%
Cold: 0%
Acid: 0%
Electricity: 0%
Radiation: 0%
Equipment
Shirt +0
Protective vest +2
Jeans +1
Shoes +0
Skills
Reinforce (Rare)
Mission: Survive until the end of the first round.
Points acquired: 25
Dante Alcantara Grade F Level 2 EXP: 11/25
Class: N/A Title:
Affiliation: None
Karma: 20
Health 9/15 MP: 14/14
Stats
Strength: 8
Agility: 6
Intelligence: 8
Mind: 7
Vitality: 5
Toughness: 6
Spirit: 8
Charisma: 5
Luck: 10
Extra Points: 2
Resistances
Fire: 0%
Water: 0%
Earth: 0%
Air: 0%
Poison: 0%
Cold: 0%
Acid: 0%
Electricity: 0%
Radiation: 0%
Equipment
Shirt +0
Protective vest +2
Jeans +1
Shoes +0
Skills
Calm Mind (Common)
Mission: Survive until the end of the first round.
Points acquired: 21